02/3 Simulation environment for interventional training and planning

A cap-choke catheter antenna for microwave ablation treatment. The upper
picture shows the antenna and the lower one the E-field distribution it
produces when inserted into tissue (calculated using a non uniform FDTD
method).

The goal of this project is to develop a comprehensive, virtual reality
based system for the realistic training of hepatic tumour treatment by RF
thermoablation, comparison and acceleration of existing simulation methods
and the thorough in vitro and in vivo validation of the applied components
for mathematical simulation.

During the past decade significant advances have been made in the
simulation of heat ablation both in the context of HF and hyperthermia
treatment. In a finite difference based numerical solution approach has been
applied for the simulation of bi- and multi-polar thermoablation. In vitro
experiments demonstrated good agreement with measured and calculated volumes
of coagulation. A first program package based on this method has already
been implemented, allowing the simulation of an intervention based on
individual patient anatomy (liver, tumour and vascularity). The usage of a
multi-scale numerical solution approach allowed to significantly reducing
computation time.

In this project the different simulation approaches will be compared,
adapted, improved and new ones will be added where necessary, in order to
match the needs of a surgical training environment in computational
performance and the precision of the simulation.

In a later phase of the work the simulation package will be extended in
order to be able to account for effects of perfusion. The performance of the
simulation package will be thoroughly validated both under ex vivo and in
vivo conditions. The resulting package will then be embedded into a virtual
reality based environment. The most important aspects to be addressed are
the generation of variable surgical scenes building on the results of the
first phase of Co-Me and the possibly realistic emulation of the
interventional environment including imaging aspects and force feedback.